


Counting Flowers

by Mad_Maudlin



Category: Harry Potter - Fandom
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Crossgen, Drunkenness, Grief, M/M, Rimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-23
Updated: 2010-01-23
Packaged: 2017-10-06 14:51:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/54861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mad_Maudlin/pseuds/Mad_Maudlin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Remus shut his eyes, and breathed deeply. <i>Lord, forgive me for what I am about to do.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Counting Flowers

Harry had been dead for three weeks when Remus gave in. _Talk to him,_ Molly had begged, _just talk to him, please, he won't listen to the rest of us. _Why would Ron listen to him, Remus had asked, if not to his own parents, his brothers, his surviving friends? Molly couldn't say it aloud, but Remus could guess the answer by the look on her face, and because of that he had resisted for three long weeks.

The problem wasn't that Molly was wrong, of course. The problem was that she was too right.

But at the end of three weeks, there was still no sign of Ron, and so Remus agreed to go to Grimmauld Place. He hadn't been back there since Siriusbut oh, Sirius was the last person he could be thinking about now. It looked dark and cold as ever, and it made Remus's spine stiffen just to knock on the door. There was no answer, but he didn't expect one; after what he judged an appropriate wait, he tested the handle, and was unsurprised to find the door unlocked.

The house was dark and filthy, and the portrait of Walpurga Black that had once howled at every visitor hung torn and stained and vacant in its frame. Remus found the cold remnants of a meal in the kitchen, but no sign of the cook. He surveyed the ground floor, but there was no sign of life; only when he ascended the stairs and began investigating the bedrooms did he find signs of something to be called life. There were tracks in the dust, doors left ajar, a layer of standing water in the bottom of the tub. And, too faintly for any normal wizard to detect, a breath of something in the air, musty and bitter.

Luckily in this one instance, Remus was an abnormal wizard.

He followed the smell to a door at the end of the hall, a room with no particular distinguishing features. Remus could not remember if there was anything special about it, if someone had lived here or slept here or died here that Ron might remember. He paused for a moment, because he had done this for Sirius, too, and Nymphadora had once done it for himbut all that was a long time ago, or felt that way. He knocked once, and then opened the door, stepping into a haze of cigarette smoke and dirty midday light.

The room was empty but for one chair and a bed, where Ron lay asleep in a nest of creased sheets and cigarette butts. He was bare-chested and barefoot, and an empty glass was loosely curled in his left hand. A half-empty bottle of fire whiskey stood on the floor, next to a saucer full of ashes and a small bag of tobacco. Remus stood on the doorway for a moment, watching the rise and fall of Ron's pale chest, but what he saw was Sirius passed out in their bed in the last days of the first war, Sirius sprawled in bed in the last days of life

"Ron," he said, as much for himself as for the boy in the bed. _"Ron."_

Ron jerked and stirred, groping in the sheets with his eyes still closed. His questing hand knocked his wand to the floor, and that seemed to awaken him fully; he sat up and wiped his face, blinking in the murky air. "Pr'fessor," he muttered, "what're you doin' here?"

"Your mother asked me to come," he said. "She's worried about you."

Ron made a face, and looked away towards the window. "'M fine," he said, drawing up his knees.

"I'm not entirely certain of that," Remus said. He took a step towards the lonely chair. "May I sit?"

Ron only shrugged. He had been thin as long as Remus had known him, but there was something about the way his skin stretched along his collarbone and shoulders that Remus didn't like. The old scars on his arms looked almost as vivid as the new one that carved down his stomach, and his chin was shadowed with a thin, fuzzy beard. He did not look eighteen years old; he looked at the same time much older and much, much younger.

"How long have you been smoking?" Remus asked, nudging the tobacco with his foot.

"Long enough," Ron said harshly.

"I never understood the appeal myself," Remus said. He had argued with Sirius about it often enough, the pervasive smell and the creeping yellow stains, but Sirius wouldn't, or couldn't, give it up. Though maybe, he was now able to admit, they had been arguing about more than cigarettes; there had been so much to argue about in those days, and so very little to say.

"Harry said," Ron blurted, but fell silent, face crumpling in pain. He set the glass on the mattress and folded his arms across his knees, hunching forward.

Remus wasn't a tactile person by nature, and he shouldn't have touched Ron now. But this was why Molly had asked him to come hereasked all unknowing, or knowing but not understanding. So Remus reached out and let his hand rest lightly on Ron's shoulder, feeling the ridges of bone and the sudden bunching of the long muscles. "I know what you're feeling right now," he said.

"No, you don't," Ron choked.

"Don't I?" Remus asked without heat. "I know what it is the lose a dear friend, Ron"

"Did you ever have to _watch_?"

"More than once."

The shoulder under his hand hitched a few times, but Ron either wouldn't or couldn't speak. Remus stroked his back lightly, the white skin sprinkled with freckles and the odd divot of a scaracne or dragonpox, not curses. He had accepted enough comfort in his life to know how useless it could be, but this was Ron, one of many children he had watched grow all too quickly. One of he few who had survived.

Remus was something of an expert on the art of survival.

"It tears you up inside, doesn't it?" he said quietly, mostly for the sake of having something to say. "Like poison. Like you're dying, too. You can't hide from it, because it's inside you, and you can't drown it, because all the drink in the world still fades away...though that doesn't seem to have stopped you trying."

"I'm of age," Ron choked out defensively. "I can do what I want."

_Like fight a war. _They had all thought so, once_._ "It's not healthy of you to stay here alone," Remus said.

"He l-left it all to me," Ron said, and hiccupped a little. "I can stay if I want."

"But that doesn't mean you should."

"Don't tell me what I should do!" Ron suddenly shouted, twisting away from Remus's hand to glare at him. "I shouldn't have let him die, should I? I should've died to save him!"

Remus's heart twisted painfully as he stared into Ron's tear-streaked face. He had always thought of Ron as being something like Sirius, if only for his obvious devotion to Harry. But they were like each other in other ways, too, so passionate and so transparent about their passions. So consumed by them. So lost.

He knew he was treading on dangerous ground when he said, "You only wish you were dead because you think it wouldn't hurt so much if you were."

"If I had helped him"

"If you could've held your own insides in and had the strength to levitate a feather," Remus said, trying to gentle the tone but not the words, "if you could've helped at all, it would not have changed anything Voldemort did, or anything Harry had to do."

"You don't know that," Ron said, and leaned over, reaching for either the bottle or the tobacco. Remus grabbed him by the shoulder again, stopping him, and Ron recoiled as if he'd been burned.

"You want to blame yourself because it hurts less that way," he said softly, ruthlessly. "If you failed him, it means he didn't abandon you, and you can put down all your anger and betrayal and hatred"

_"I didn't hate him!"_ Ron said, his whole thin body bowing with the effort. "I lI lo"

He bowed his head, unable to even voice the word, and Remus felt the floor drop out of his world. Of all the reactions he could've provoked, he would never have anticipated this one. Quietly, carefully, he shifted from the chair to the bedside and touched Ron's back again. After several deep breaths for both of them, he said for the second time, "I know how it feels."

Ron didn't deny it this time; he wiped his eyes with the back of one hand and peeked up through his fringe. "Tonks?" he asked hoarsely.

Remus shook his head. "No, she and I had already gone our separate ways."

"Who, then?"

"Someone I couldn't save," he said. "Someone I lost a long time ago." Both statements were, in their own ways, true.

Ron nodded, and some of the tension seemed to flow out of him; he slumped backwards into the pressure of Remus's hand, and Remus stretched it out into a supportive arm. "It stops, right?" Ron said plaintively. "It goes away?"

"Love never goes away," Remus said. _Even if you want it to. _"Pain, to a very great extend, is something you carry with you. You must make yourself put it down, which is very hard, and then you must leave it, which is harder, and even then you'll always feel where it used to be, like a missing hand. But you can live without a hand, and in time, you will live with this, too."

Ron's whole body leaned into Remus, brittle and warm, and one of his hands brushed every so slightly against Remus's thigh. "How do I do it, though? How do I...put it down, like you said?"

"I don't know that it's something I can explain"

"Please." Ron twisted around to look at him, practically climbed into his lap as he stared with big wet eyes. "Please, Professor, I don'tI can'tit hurts, it _hurts,_ and it never stops, and I c-can't"

He buried his face in Remus's shoulder and sobbed, big wet ones that shook his entire frame. Remus shifted on the bed somewhat to make them both more comfortable; no one watching would've known that Ron was taller than him, by the way the boy curled up into his arms. Tall but so very thin, and his heart beat hummingbird-fast against Remus's chest and he wept freely for perhaps the first time in three weeks. Wept and sniffled and choked and coughed and all the other undignified noises of grief, soaking through Remus's robes while his knees and elbows settled in awkward places. This was the catharsis Remus had been trying to provoke, even if it had come by an unexpected route, and he stroked Ron's back and hummed him through it. It was only the first step, but it was _a_ step, and he felt sure that it would at least get Ron out of this blasted house, the one thing Sirius had needed and Remus simply could not do.

(But Ron isn't Sirius, he told himself, and the comparison obscures more than it reveals.)

After a few long minutes the great sobs stopped, but it was longer before the hiccups and sniffles subsided. "Sorry," Ron whispered against the wet spot after he'd been quiet for several minutes.

"There's no need to apologize," Remus said, and kept up the gentle circles along the sharp ridge of his spine.

Ron took a deep breath and held it, craning his head to look Remus in the eye. Then he suddenly surged upwards and kissed him, lips wet and sticky and closing over his with a desperate puppyish eagerness. Remus lurched backwards, but Ron clung with all his wiry strength. "Please," he said again, _"please,_ Professor, I can'tI want to feel something, anything, I want to know it'll go away and I don't know how to put it down if it's all there is, help me, please"

Remus's hands were shaking, but he managed to firmly pull Ron's hands from his robes and push himperhaps too roughlyaway. This was not what Molly Weasley had asked him for. This was why he hadn't wanted to come. This was why he hadn't spoken Sirius' name aloud, because it would only take him back to the last time he was in this house, arguing with Sirius, searching an angry, bitter drunkard for the boy he'd loved, or at least the man that boy had become. Ron wasn't Sirius, though, and Remus couldn't let himself confuse the two, even if Ron was offering what Sirius had been too broken to give. Sirius, after all, had been an adult, a peer. Sirius had been deep in his cups, but never quite out of control, never irrational until the very end. Sirius had needed Remus, even if he'd been too damn proud to admit as much to himself, and possibly Remus had needed Sirius a little bit, too.

Sirius had never sat at the foot of a bed, looking so lost and miserable as Ron Weasley did now.

Remus shut his eyes, and breathed deeply. _Lord, forgive me for what I am about to do._

"I'm sorry, Professor," Ron blurted as Remus leaned closer. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have, I"

Remus captured Ron's face in hand, and effortlessly turned it upwards. "Ron," he said softly, "I am not your professor."

Ron blinked without comprehension, at least until Remus kissed him back.

For a few moments all they did was kiss, Ron clinging tightly as if Remus might at any moment try to escape. Remus, for his part, hadn't been with a man in some time (if he could even call Ron a man now) and had to remind himself how this could go. He reached down and stroked Ron's narrow ass, squeezing slightly, and Ron practically climbed into his lap with a throaty little gasp. The shift in position allowed Remus to feel Ron's erection, and he reached down to help him unfasten his jeans. Ron wobbled and slipped as he wiggled out of jeans and pants, and his knee came down precariously close to Remus's balls. "Sorry," he said, with a little cringe.

"Don't worry," Remus said, "no damage." To prevent a repeat performance, he guided Ron down to the mattress, and helped him pull off the last of his clothes, leaning over him.

The scar on Ron's stomach started above his navel and curved downward in a perfect semi-circle, touching the ridge of one hipbone before ending just above his thigh. At that moment it seemed to point obscenely at his erection, and Remus couldn't resist touching it lightly, thinking of how close a call it had been. "Does it still hurt at all?" he asked, running his thumb parallel to the lower arc.

Ron shook his head. "Nah, justpulls a little, kind of stiff_ah!" _He thrust his hips up as Remus kissed the end-point, and continued squirming as he kissed and licked his way up the long curve to end with a deep swirl around his navel. Ron's skin smelled and tasted clean, if a bit sweaty; at least he'd kept showering during his self-imposed mourning period. Remus licked over one of Ron's nipples, earning another surprised cry, before stretching out over him and pinning him with his slightly greater weight. Ron squirmed and managed a half-hearted thrust again Remus's thigh, but that was all.

"I need to know," Remus said in Ron's ear. "How far have you gonebefore?"

Ron went still and shut his eyes, and Remus wondered for a moment if he'd killed this fragile thing in the egg. "Not...all the way," Ron finally said, raising a hand to Remus's neck. "But we did...stuff. Um. Can I, can I see you?"

He supposed that was the most detailed reply Ron was willing to give, but if he remembered the world of teenagers it was probably enough. "If you want to," he replied, and began to shrug out of his robes. Ron helped with more enthusiasm than skill, pulling at buttons and tossing away socks and y-fronts until Remus knelt fully naked over him. He didn't even try not to stare at Greyback's livid bite on Remus's thigh, or Peter's palm-shaped farewell gift, Remus's own recent close call.

Remus thought self-consciously that this broken-down body probably wasn't what Ron had had in mind, but then Ron blurted apropos of nothing, "You've got grey pubes."

Remus couldn't help but laugh, and then Ron was laughing, laughing like he was shocked he still could. And perhaps that was the kind of reminder Ron needed, not sexual pleasure, but Remus felt he'd gone too far now to stop. Instead he leaned forward and kissed Ron's laughing mouth, letting his weight press their erections together. "I'm afraid it comes with the package," he murmured, and then nuzzled Ron's fuzzy jaw and the curve of his ear, licking and sucking (but very carefully _not_ biting).

Ron panted loudly and thrust furiously against Remus's body, eyes falling shut. Remus dropped his mouth to Ron's neck, worrying at the sharp tendons and the thunder of his pulse, and Ron suddenly blurted "No, no, no, gonna" and then he did, in wet pulses along Remus's belly. "Oh, oh, damn it, I'm so sorry."

Remus shushed him before he could work himself out of the mood. "Grey hairs or not, Ron, I was eighteen once myself. I understand." He stroked Ron's hair and kissed his neck, then is mouth, carefully and thoroughly. "I think I know something you'll enjoy, if you'd like to try it."

"What is it?" Ron asked.

Remus bent his head to kiss Ron's nipple again. "I'll show you. If you don't like it, just say so."

He kissed Ron's stomach again, tasted the smears of semen on it, then moved past his half-soft cock to plant a kiss on his inner thigh. "Pull your knees up to your chest," he said. Ron obliged, and Remus carefully lifted his balled out of the way and planted a kiss on his perineum. Then lower, and lower, inhaling all the musky scents of him and his desire until he was able to lick gently between his cheeks.

Ron's body went stiff and tight. "PrRemus, I never...we didn't..."

"I know," he said. "That's not what I'm doing." He carefully spread Ron's cheeks and licked slow circles around his tightly-clenched hole. Far above, Ron made a strangled noise. "Does that feel good?"

"Yeah," Ron sighed, and Remus allowed himself another small smile.

He licked and kissed Ron's hole in earnest, occasionally allowing himself broad swipes across, until the muscle began to relax. Then he started stabbing his tongue inward, swirling gently, listening to Ron's ever-increasing cries of pleasure. His own cock burned with need, but he concentrated only on Ron, savoring the little shivers in his thighs as he rocked forward against Remus's face. "Please," Ron suddenly said hoarsely, "please, Remus, please, let meI need to"

Remus pushed himself up and found Ron's erection returned to full strength with all the stamina of youth. On impulse, he leaned forward and took the head into his mouth, sucking while he ran his tongue along the tight roll of foreskin. Ron moaned loudly and his whole body jackknifed as he released his legs and thrust upward into Remus's mouth; Remus pressed Ron's hips firmly into the mattress, and kept sucking, sliding his lips inch by inch down the shaft. It was thick and awkward in his mouth, because he was out of practice, but the taste of his precome and the musky smell of him filled Remus's senses and urged him on.

Ron's second orgasm was just as abrupt as the first, but there was no blurted warning; in contrast, he went abruptly silent as his whole body bowed upward and he came into Remus's mouth. He collapsed in a panting pile, and Remus crawled back up to lay next to him. "Are you all right?"

Ron inhaled, deep and shaky, and instead of answering he reached for Remus's cock. "Can I...?" he ask, just barely touching the head.

"Only if you want to," Remus said, and then sighed as Ron wrapped his long, thin fingers around him and slowly began to pull him off.

It wasn't a particularly good handjobRon seemed nervous and uncertain, especially considering what they'd already done together. Remus tried to guide him a bit, but it only made his hand go pointlessly limp. His stomach sank, as he wondered if Ron was only doing this out of some sense of obligation, if the outside world and all its weight and worries was reasserting itself inside this brief intimate bubble they had made, if he was going to have to pay the consequences of this choice so quickly.

Then he felt a damp spot on his shoulder, where Ron's face was pressed, and heard another hitch in his breath. "Oh, Ron," he said, and pulled him into a hug, sex briefly forgotten. "Ron, talk to me."

"Sorry," he gasped. "Sorry, sorry"

"Stop that." Remus tilted Ron's face up and kissed him gently. "You have nothing to apologize for."

Ron swallowed a few times and choked on a sob. "You're going to stick around, right? You're not leaving or anything?"

"Absolutely not," Remus said with more confidence than he should've had."

"I don't know what to do next."

Remus kissed his forehead, knowing full well he was in no position to promise anything. "I'll help you, Ron. Any way I can."

Ron kissed him back, more firmly, and Remus stroked his hair and hummed to him until he fell asleep. Then he slowly extricated himself from the boy's sleeping embrace and sat up, watching his thin chest rise and fall and the smears of semen on his stomach slowly dry.

Remus masturbated fast and hard, thinking of Ron's cock in his mouth, then conjured a washcloth to clean them both off. Ron squirmed in his sleep, sort of arching into Remus's hand, but didn't wake. That accomplished, Remus picked up the pouch of tobacco off the floor and rolled himself a cigarette. A filthy habit, he'd always told Sirius, but he couldn't resist it any more than he'd been able to resist Sirius himself, even in their darkest hours.

He went through Grimmauld Place and systematically opened up curtains, letting in as much light as London allowed them. He swept the dust from the floors and walls where he happened to pass, and then he systematically searched all the mostly lived-in areas for bottles or flasks. He found several, not as many as he'd feared but more than he would've liked. One by one, he emptied them down the kitchen sink, and then lined them up along the edge of the kitchen table.

Ron awoke from his post-coital nap in time to catch the tail end of the process. To his credit, he didn't flinch from the evidence in front of him; he just dropped into a chair, scratched under the waistband of his jeans, and watched as Remus dumped out the last of the liquor.

"What now?" he asked as the bottle hit the table.

Remus took the chair across from him. Ron wasn't Sirius, but that didn't mean he couldn't try to save him anyway. "Now," he said, "we need to talk."


End file.
